It wouldn’t be a list of animals that remind you of Halloween without mentioning bats, which are probably the No. 1 animal associated with the holiday. Can a house even be haunted — real or imaginary — if bats aren’t living in the attic?
The link between bats and Halloween most likely got started because of vampire bats, which drink blood, according to the Sycamore Land Trust. But of the more than 1,300 bat species in the world, only three feed primarily on blood, and none live predominantly in the United States. Of the three, only one has been found in the United States, and only in extreme southwest Texas, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The link between bats and Halloween is a strong one at this point. Bat Conservation International has seized on it as an opportunity to celebrate bats and educate people about their importance to the ecosystem by holding Bat Week each year during the week that includes Halloween. Second only to bats in the spooky skies category would be owls, those nighttime creatures of the forest.
Throughout history, owls have been associated with death, witchcraft and mystery, so it’s a pretty straight line to its current association with Halloween. In Africa, many tribes call owls a term that translates as “witchbird,” and in many cultures owls have been hunted in an attempt to rid villages of evil or death, according to High Desert Museum.
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(Photos via Shutterstock)
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